In the realm of email that I thought I'd sent, but upon review, did not ...
On Fri, Oct 1, 2021 at 8:01 PM John C Klensin <john-ietf@xxxxxxx> wrote:
<snipped down to>
(3) From observation of results, Nomcoms are often inclined to
return incumbents who are willing to serve again (and who have
not been absolute disasters). This is understandable:
borrowing a metaphor, not only is the devil one knows better
than the one one does not, but the good person one knows is
clearly more attractive than someone unknown (at least for
performance in that role). For people who believe an incumbent
has been doing an ok (or better) job, that is a disincentive to
putting their names in for that position... especially if doing
so requires rearranging of schedules, getting employer
permission, guaranteeing travel and time support, etc. I have
no idea how to solve that problem, at least without changes the
IESG has been disinclined to consider or let the community
consider (Spencer might even remember an ancient (and long-dead)
attempt at part of the issue in the form of
draft-klensin-nomcom-incumbents-first).
Spencer does, in fact, remember that draft (available at https://www.ietf.org/archive/id/draft-klensin-nomcom-incumbents-first-01.txt), having been a co-author.
There are details that were correct in 2009, or even in 2006, that need to be changed, and *I* was certainly more focused on Nomcom evaluation of IESG incumbents than anyone else, when we were writing this, but I think that ancient draft would be a reasonable starting point if anyone in the community thought pursuing the idea of evaluating incumbents differently was worthwhile.
And I still think evaluating incumbents, especially on the IESG, was a good idea, then, and now.
Best,
Spencer
